It just doesn't happen as much as people thing. For instance, in 2011, everyone said Cabrera would be pitched to more now that Victor is behind him. Victor had a great year, yet Cabrera set a career high in walks.

You can hypothesize what you would do as a pitcher all day long but if you look at factual data you'll see that things don't really change that much for a hitter based on who is hitting before and after him.

The idea is always to get him out, but the way you go about that is impacted by the guy in the on deck circle.

I am not saying it's going to make a dramatic difference, but to say it doesn't exist is ridiculous. You can quantify it however you'd like, but Torii Hunter is going to get more hittable pitches with Cabrera behind him than he would with Danny Worth behind him. Is there any disagreement there? I'm not saying it's going to make him a stud, but it's there. It exists. It isn't a myth.

I do agree, however, that it doesn't exist to the extent a lot of people believe it to. However, I just don't see where it comes across as "lineup protection is a myth"

If Danny Worth is behind him, they would probably pitch around Hunter sometimes because they'd rather pitch to Worth. I don't think they want to give him good pitches to hit with Cabrera behind him though. They would never want to give him good pitches.

The Pittsburgh Pirates are threatening all-time records for offensive ineptitude. They are scoring just 2.86 runs per game and posting a .266 on-base percentage, which would tie the 1908 Brooklyn Superbas for the lowest mark any team has posted since 1900. And yet, surrounded by teammates who are performing at historically inept levels, center fielder Andrew McCutchen has been brilliant.

Through his first 41 games, McCutchen was hitting .338/.391/.543 and racking up 20 percent of the team's home runs and runs scored totals by himself. Already a budding star, McCutchen is posting career highs in batting average, OBP and slugging percentage, and he's doing it with the worst surrounding cast anybody has had in quite some time.

The Pirates' rotation of "cleanup hitters" -- which has included Pedro Alvarez, Neil Walker and Casey McGehee -- has combined to hit .199/.258/.280 when batting behind McCutchen. With this kind of protection, you might think McCutchen would be on a career-high pace for walks and rarely seeing a pitch anywhere near the strike zone.

You would be wrong. McCutchen is actually seeing more pitches in the strike zone this year than in any other season of his career. Here are the Pitch F/X data for percent of pitches he has seen in the zone over the past four years:

As a response to the increased number of strikes he's seeing, McCutchen is also swinging at more pitches than ever, and the combination of more strikes and more swings has led to the lowest walk rate of his career. After drawing 89 free passes last year, he had just 13 in the first quarter of the 2012 season, and two of those were intentional.

It's hard to explain these results under the umbrella of the "protection theory," which holds that batters get better pitches to hit if there is a quality hitter on deck, as pitchers don't want to issue a walk that would put a runner on for that quality hitter. It's hard to imagine the Pirates' cleanup hitters are intimidating anyone right now, however, so how do we explain why McCutchen is being thrown so many strikes in a lineup that is one of the most futile in the game's history?

Small sample size would be one explanation, as one example doesn't prove anything conclusively. But we can look around the league and see other scenarios where the protection theory would suggest a significant difference from what is taking place. In Milwaukee, Ryan Braun's protector shifted from Prince Fielder to Aramis Ramirez, and the lack of Fielder's presence was supposed to lead to a significant uptick in walks for Braun as pitchers chose to go after the much weaker hitting right-hander instead.

However, Braun's percentage of pitches in the strike zone has also gone up from what it was a year ago and, like McCutchen, he's also walking less than he did when he was better protected. In fact, even with Fielder in Detroit, Braun has yet to draw an intentional walk this season, and his .323/.393/.621 line would be the best of his career. The idea that Fielder's presence was getting Braun better pitches to hit is harder to swallow when Braun gets more strikes and hits even better after Fielder switches leagues.

For another example, simply look to another team in the NL Central, as Joey Votto is mashing the ball for the Reds but regularly getting stranded by an anemic collection of cleanup hitters behind him. The combination of Brandon Phillips and Scott Rolen (along with a couple of appearances from Jay Bruce and Ryan Ludwick) have combined to post a .648 OPS in the No. 4 spot in the order, 50 points lower than what the Reds' No. 8 hitters have done. Votto is perhaps the game's best left-handed hitter, but despite being protected by a second baseman whose primary value comes from his defense, he's seen no change in the rate of strikes he's been thrown. In fact, over the past four years, the percentage of pitches that Votto has seen in the zone has hardly moved at all, coming in between 44.4 and 44.9 percent in each season since 2009.

If the protection theory was true, we'd have expected Braun's walk rate to spike, McCutchen to be leading the league in free passes, and Votto's performance to fall off once the Reds had to move a middle infielder into the cleanup spot. We haven't seen any of those things, and it's worth noting that Miguel Cabrera -- the guy now benefiting from the intimidating on-deck presence of Fielder -- is having his worst offensive season since 2008.

The protection theory sounds true enough, but it begins to break down once you look at the evidence and think through the conclusions it forces you to draw. After all, the basic premise of the theory is that pitchers are going to change their approach in such a way that it benefits the hitter being protected, making it more likely he gets a pitch to hit. However, that is the result the pitcher is supposedly trying to prevent, so the protection theory forces us to believe that pitchers choose to throw pitches that make it more likely that they have to face the scary on-deck hitter with a man on.

If the protection theory held true in real life, it would be on prominent display in Pittsburgh, Milwaukee and Cincinnati. The evidence suggests that pitchers simply aren't pitching McCutchen, Braun and Votto any differently now than they were when they were better protected, and all three are carrying their teams despite a lack of firepower behind them.

"... it's worth noting that Miguel Cabrera -- the guy now benefiting from the intimidating on-deck presence of Fielder -- is having his worst offensive season since 2008...."

I do believe in the theory of giving great hitters protection, but some of the "evidence" against it is a bit suspect. For instace McCutchen and Braun can both hit home runs AND steal bases (McCutchen stole 20 and Braun stole 30 in 2012). Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder and V-Mart ain't that type of player.

If your a pitcher and you "walk" McCutchen or Braun, they may put themself in scoring position via stolen base (heck, they might steal 2nd and 3B too...). Pitchers may respect the players stolen base ability and decide to try and get them out rather than let them walk. If you walk Miguel Cabrera...you simply set up a double play.

Also part of the problem was that V-Mart in 2011 hit 12 home runs in 540 AB's. So pitchers who fell behind Cabrera were happy to walk Cabrera to face V-Mart because the likelyhood Cabrera would steal to get into scoring position was amazingly small and V-Mart ground into 20 double plays to match his 12 home runs If your curious, Cabrera walked 108 times in 2011 with V-Mart protecting him. This was the most amount of walks Cabrera has ever been issued in a single year!!!!!

Suddenly, when Fielder is Cabrera's protection for 2012, things changed a bit. Fielder hit 30 HR's and ground into 19 double plays. Teams started to realize if you pitch around Cabrera than a 2 run home run by Fielder was more likely to happen than Fielder grounding into a double play. So, teams started to take the percentages and pitch to both Cabrera and Fielder and hope they both don't hit back to back solo home runs. I know this sounds wierd, but think about this for a second, Cabrera went from getting walked 108 times in 2011 to only 66 times and walked away with a triple crown for the 2012 season...

“Diplomacy is the art of saying "Nice doggie" until you can find a rock.” -Will Rogers

THere was some great twitter exchanges between Torii and fans about where to live.

Love it when athletes exchange banter with fans like that.

Yeah it is.

"And that is part of the larger pattern of the appeal of a new online collectivism that is nothing less than a resurgence of the idea that the collective is all-wise, that it is desirable to have influence concentrated in a bottleneck that can channel the collective with the most verity and force."

Every time you play a hand of you poker you wanna run through a mental check list. Head Position Hand Position Neck Position Breathing Posture. More than 25 items. It's a lot. And that why I've come up with a handy mnemonic device. Just one word: HPHPNPBPECMSPAMDCPAFTSTTL. It's easy.

"... it's worth noting that Miguel Cabrera -- the guy now benefiting from the intimidating on-deck presence of Fielder -- is having his worst offensive season since 2008...."

I do believe in the theory of giving great hitters protection, but some of the "evidence" against it is a bit suspect. For instace McCutchen and Braun can both hit home runs AND steal bases (McCutchen stole 20 and Braun stole 30 in 2012). Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder and V-Mart ain't that type of player.

If your a pitcher and you "walk" McCutchen or Braun, they may put themself in scoring position via stolen base (heck, they might steal 2nd and 3B too...). Pitchers may respect the players stolen base ability and decide to try and get them out rather than let them walk. If you walk Miguel Cabrera...you simply set up a double play.

Also part of the problem was that V-Mart in 2011 hit 12 home runs in 540 AB's. So pitchers who fell behind Cabrera were happy to walk Cabrera to face V-Mart because the likelyhood Cabrera would steal to get into scoring position was amazingly small and V-Mart ground into 20 double plays to match his 12 home runs If your curious, Cabrera walked 108 times in 2011 with V-Mart protecting him. This was the most amount of walks Cabrera has ever been issued in a single year!!!!!

Suddenly, when Fielder is Cabrera's protection for 2012, things changed a bit. Fielder hit 30 HR's and ground into 19 double plays. Teams started to realize if you pitch around Cabrera than a 2 run home run by Fielder was more likely to happen than Fielder grounding into a double play. So, teams started to take the percentages and pitch to both Cabrera and Fielder and hope they both don't hit back to back solo home runs. I know this sounds wierd, but think about this for a second, Cabrera went from getting walked 108 times in 2011 to only 66 times and walked away with a triple crown for the 2012 season...

I'd prefer the 40+ walks to the triple crown personally.

I'm somewhat skeptical of both the idea behind lineup protection (I don't think it exists in general) and the studies that are done around it (I don't think they tell us much about whether lineup protection exists). So much of the decision to pitch around players is situational that it's difficult to keep things constant from year to year. It isn't just who is hitting behind you but also who is hitting in front of you. Cabrera hit in the 4 spot for most of 2011 and the 3 spot for most of 2012. Combine that with Jackson's polar opposite seasons between 2011 and 2012 and I don't see how the two years are comparable. That's ignoring the difference between Fielder and Martinez. One that you don't mention is that Martinez is a switch hitter that does not have much of a platoon split. That isn't true of Fielder, who is essentially Miguel Cabrera against righties and actually worse than Martinez against lefties. That changes the strategic options considerably for the opposing manager.

Slowsilver: They did a study at Baseball Prospectus and found out that bionic parts increase WARP23 by 6.7% on average. Back in the steroid era, steroids only increased WARP23 by 4.6%

I'm somewhat skeptical of both the idea behind lineup protection (I don't think it exists in general) and the studies that are done around it (I don't think they tell us much about whether lineup protection exists). So much of the decision to pitch around players is situational that it's difficult to keep things constant from year to year. It isn't just who is hitting behind you but also who is hitting in front of you. Cabrera hit in the 4 spot for most of 2011 and the 3 spot for most of 2012. Combine that with Jackson's polar opposite seasons between 2011 and 2012 and I don't see how the two years are comparable. That's ignoring the difference between Fielder and Martinez. One that you don't mention is that Martinez is a switch hitter that does not have much of a platoon split. That isn't true of Fielder, who is essentially Miguel Cabrera against righties and actually worse than Martinez against lefties. That changes the strategic options considerably for the opposing manager.

I don't know how related the are, but the -42 walks Cabrera had in 2012 vs 2011 (108 in 2011 and 66 in 2012) may have had something to do with Cabrera's difference regarding his home runs (+14 since 2011) and RBI's (+34 RBI's since 2011). Nothing personal but I'd give up 42 walks a year for 14 additional home runs and 34 RBI's in just about any player in any year....

I do agree with you about trying to quantify lineup protection, there is so many variables to account for, I'm not sure anyone can prove it or disprove it with any degree of certainty.

“Diplomacy is the art of saying "Nice doggie" until you can find a rock.” -Will Rogers

I don't know how related the are, but the -42 walks Cabrera had in 2012 vs 2011 (108 in 2011 and 66 in 2012) may have had something to do with Cabrera's difference regarding his home runs (+14 since 2011) and RBI's (+34 RBI's since 2011). Nothing personal but I'd give up 42 walks a year for 14 additional home runs and 34 RBI's in just about any player in any year....

I do agree with you about trying to quantify lineup protection, there is so many variables to account for, I'm not sure anyone can prove it or disprove it with any degree of certainty.

I don't think you can credit all 14 HR's and RBI's to the drop in walks (for example, his drop in doubles is part of the increase in HR's) and the 42 walks aren't the only thing he gave up. I would not trade 50 points in OBP for 20 points in SLG.

Slowsilver: They did a study at Baseball Prospectus and found out that bionic parts increase WARP23 by 6.7% on average. Back in the steroid era, steroids only increased WARP23 by 4.6%

Every time you play a hand of you poker you wanna run through a mental check list. Head Position Hand Position Neck Position Breathing Posture. More than 25 items. It's a lot. And that why I've come up with a handy mnemonic device. Just one word: HPHPNPBPECMSPAMDCPAFTSTTL. It's easy.

"Torii Hunter is a quality major league player who is a tremendous addition to the Tigers organization both on and off the field," Tigers president and general manager David Dombrowski said. "He continues to be a consistent contributor at the plate, in the outfield and on bases, and we feel Torii is a great fit for our lineup."

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"Thirty for me, that's yesterday," Valverde said. "It doesn't matter how many saves I have right now. The goal right now is the Tigers in first place, try to win every day, go to the playoffs and win everything."

Every time you play a hand of you poker you wanna run through a mental check list. Head Position Hand Position Neck Position Breathing Posture. More than 25 items. It's a lot. And that why I've come up with a handy mnemonic device. Just one word: HPHPNPBPECMSPAMDCPAFTSTTL. It's easy.

lol that's pretty bad but in their defense Delmon has killed them(he has a .315BA with a .927 OPS against them the last 3 years), so maybe to them Delmon seems like a better hitter than he actually is. I know I've been guilty of that in the past with Tiger killers.

To me this is more about hitters falling in love with walks because it's the thing to do these days. Everytime I watch a guy like Cabrera take a belt high pitch because he knows it's going to be called a ball, I cringe knowing he could add a lot of offensive production just by hitting those pitchers that are just outside of our insanely small strikezones.

Let's look at Cabrera for 2011 and 2012

2011 Career High 108 Walks, dropped to 66 this season.

that's 42 more times that he was swinging the bat vs the year prior.

He had an extra 14 homeruns and 34 rbi. His batting average dropped from .344 to .330 but his BABIP was also down from .365 - .331 So his AVG and BABIP drop based on swinging a little more. He actually swung at 1.5% more pitches outside the strike zone and .4% less strikes. He had a crazy 71.3% contact when he swings which was somehow down from the year before. And just as surprisingly he saw more strikes 46.8% than he's seen since 2009.

When you get to the aspect of runners on base is where you see the huge difference, in 2011 he took 60 walks in 344 PA with runners on base. In 2012 he only took 34 walks in 333 PA with runners on. He drove in 21 more runs with runners on than he did in 2011. I don't believe it has to do with Prince or whoever is batting behind him , although he did see a minor amount more fastballs and Prince saw about 7% less fastballs than Miggy did. So it looks like it's a bit of a combination of both ideas.

Put me on record. Prince Fielder will still OPS 850+ in years 7-8-9 of this contract. (sucks that my signature has to stay this for 7 years now)